Building semi-automatic small gauge wire stripper

This is my first electronics project, and I've been working on a semi-automatic small gauge wire stripper, made from scrap as much as possible,
one motor powered by 9v battery, one by 3v watch battery. I want to feed the small gauge wire into a slot, hit a switch, and have a cleanly slit wire out the other end within seconds. I'm using DC motors, gears and hardware from VCRs, printers, and CDROMS, and I'm starting to pull relay switches and other components from TV boards. Tomorrow I'm going to make a breadboard out of ribbon cable connectors. I'm also trying to work out a gear train that will take the ~20k rpm of the 12v dc motor down to about 60 rpm.
I need to wire up a relay circuit to start the motor (A) with a signal from a physical push button switch, moving a razor blade cutting down into the insulation of a wire. Then stop the motor when it receives a signal through the blade when it contacts copper wire, while sending a signal to a different motor (B) that feeds the wire past the blade. (The wire is now being stripped, have a drink). A physical switch will send signal to reverse direction of motor A, returning it to its start position (once it gets there, it needs a signal to stop), and same switch will tell motor B to stop.
Getting current through the wire can be done by manually slicing a bit of the insulation and clipping an alligator clip on the end of the wire connected to another battery. Once motor A detects the current through the blade, motor B will start the feed rollers with enough force to knock the clip off as it hits the housing.
With extra precision, I think it would be possible to have the blade horizontal/paralell, so you could use the full length of the blade, shifting the cutting surface once it gets dull, or at a timed interval.

I welcome any advice..I barely know what I'm doing

wow , this seems like a fun project. I have only a little knowledge on creating circuits to do what you envision. If i may suggest a few things. Maybe try to have the blades on a mechanical spring mechanism. A spring with enough tension could self adjust for different gauges and sheath thicknesses. Maybe also try using a Infrared Diode sensor before and after the cutting mechanism. It could trigger a feed motor once a wire is pushed through and shut off once it exits. I have found these in VCRs, DVD players and some printers. Hope this helps and good luck.

Neat project. Please share procedures and pictures when you are successful. It sounds like something many on the forum would be interested in. Good luck.

A planetary reducer would be the most compact unit to reduce 20,000 down to 60 RPM,,or you could use a compound pulley system.

At any rate it wont take you long to figure out that your stripper will not come to fruit using your selection of recycled parts. There are better parts to choose from with heavier duty cycles.

Originally Posted by alloy2

At any rate it wont take you long to figure out that your stripper will not come to fruit using your selection of recycled parts. There are better parts to choose from with heavier duty cycles.

I realize that. However, I am excited about the challenge of using parts that I have scrapped. I will also consider parts I find at the flea market or thrift stores. I've already got the RPMs pretty low using 3 or 4 VCR gears and a half dead battery, and I can tweak to my heart's content.

You will find this type of stepper motor in a lot of the type of equipment we scrap, these motors require a circuit called a driver that driver communicates via software with the motor controlling speed and direction forward and reverse

Stepper motors make 3D printing possible along with a multitude of other automated types or equipment performing repetitious movements or reading from a DXF / DWG file to make a part on a CNC lathe or milling machine.

Stepper motors also make great wind mill generators.



The open source Reprap 3D printer, plans freely available on the Internet.